In the name of love : fairy tales for the digital age

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Authors

Williams, Kerigan E.

Advisor

Crowe, Rani

Issue Date

2020-05-02

Keyword

Degree

Thesis (M.A.)

Department

Department of English

Other Identifiers

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Abstract

This project of fairy tale reimaginings, retellings, and adaptations was completed in order to explore the various ways that women were represented in traditional fairy tales. With source material such as “The Gingerbread Man,” “The Twelve Dancing Princesses,” as well as a third story of my own design, these stories feature strong, ambitious, purposefully messy women who make mistakes, unlike the practically perfect women featured in the original fairy tales. Magic plays a strong role in the original fairy tales, and it is present in these adaptations as well, but it looks slightly different. Rather than fairies and pumpkins transforming into carriages, there is romance and technology that act in place of these more magical elements. Through the modernization and exploration of fairy tales, the expectations of the genre and the notion of what a fairy tale is could be challenged.